Objective: To understand the situation of biomass fuel use in rural Guangdong, and how it affecting the prevalence of hypertension in adult women.
Methods: Inhabitants aged 18 and above were chosen, using multi-stage stratified cluster sampling method from 13 rural countries in Guangdong province in 2010. Questionnaire survey and blood pressure measurement were conducted. Multilevel logistic regression model was used to study the relationship between biomass fuel use and the prevalence of hypertension at both country and individual levels.
Results: Of the 5794 rural families, 2 569 (44.3%) cooked with biomass fuel in the kitchen. 1233 (46.2%) and 1 436 (53.8%) out of the 2669 adult women used biomass fuel and clean energy, respectively. Results from χ² study showed that biomass users presented higher prevalence of hypertension (RR = 1.26, 95% CI: 1.04-1.52), but in multilevel model analysis, the difference was not significant. In addition, using an extractor fan when cooking seemed to have protected factor in decreasing the risk of hypertension among biomass users (RR = 0.61, 95% CI: 0.39-0.98).
Conclusion: Proportion of the use of biomass fuel was still high among rural families in Guangdong province. Although there was not enough evidence to verify the relationship between the use of biomass fuel and hypertension in adult women. However, concerns about the use of biomass fuel which causing the indoor air pollution, should be raised.